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I just wanted to say that IMHO this lighted key thing is probably (certainly) very harmful.

No. Much more harmful is relying on written music to guide your playing.

What's good about lighted keys is that it allows you to make a direct connection between your brain and the instrument. You want that direct connection because you want your ear to learn the sound of each particular configuration (chord etc) on the keyboard. In other words you want to *internalize* as much as possible.

There was some other thread where someone mentioned that one of the famous jazz pianists (Erroll Garner?) learned to play by watching the old player pianos (the ones with the roller thing).

I just wanted to say that IMHO this lighted key thing is probably (certainly) very harmful.

No. Much more harmful is relying on written music to guide your playing.

What's good about lighted keys is that it allows you to make a direct connection between your brain and the instrument. You want that direct connection because you want your ear to learn the sound of each particular configuration (chord etc) on the keyboard. In other words you want to *internalize* as much as possible.

There was some other thread where someone mentioned that one of the famous jazz pianists (Erroll Garner?) learned to play by watching the old player pianos (the ones with the roller thing).

Interesting that someone learned to play (at least in part) by watching piano rolls as they rolled(pun intended) and the player sounded.I am now wondering how much controversy raged over that 100 or so years ago (-:

Synthesia presents a display a bit like an upright player piano, ...now that I've looked it up in another window I think it was probably a deliberate goal.This;http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySrUS7hTxIQand similar might just motivate a youngster if put on a laptop and propped over a piano keyboard - more likely they would ask for a different piece, but it could set bait.

I can't represent the graphics arts community, but I suspect they view painting by numbers with GREAT disdain.My view is very much that if it gets a brush in someone's hand because it now looks SO EASY then it may not be all that bad.

Some will get bored, some will try painting on blank paper.Copying initially, perhaps creating something original at some point.Point is it may make the piano more approachable, is cheap enough, etc.Not for everyone, not a substitute for a good teacher, but hopefully a gateway.

I am probably going to get one of these for my grandchildren.They see me play (poorly) and I think this could work to get some of them to at least give it a second (and/or third) try.A couple of tunes, then maybe I hide it (-:

Training wheels ? maybe they just reduce the scary factor and we learn to get by without them.

Interesting that as an artist you don't think highly of painting by numbers, but the same is ok for piano? What is scary about piano? I can't recall the last piano student who came to me scared of playing. Perhaps you are projecting onto others what you feel as an adult? Adults are different, but I still don't think playing this way helps them overcome whatever reservations they have. Most adults love the idea enough to overcome their initial fears.

I don't regard myself as ANY sort of an artist, though that is beside the point.

I think that IF paint by numbers motivates a child (or an adult) then that is probably fine.I think there is a possibility that on the basis of their experiment they might decide that painting is not for them. In such a case the community of formal art training may have lost a potential student - if only they had started in a "REAL" art class, etc.

The advent of the ball point pen was widely predicted to ruin anyone's chances of developing even half decent handwriting.Maybe that is still being argued, but I think the sharpening of quills is no longer taught (-: